


Cria

by cantabrasil03



Series: Case-se Comigo [4]
Category: Free!
Genre: F/M, Gen, RIN FOR UNCLE OF THE YEAR, family!fic, more makogou haha what else from me, the result of excellent discussions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-19
Updated: 2013-10-19
Packaged: 2017-12-29 20:01:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1009482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cantabrasil03/pseuds/cantabrasil03
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Continuation of And Perhaps... But I guess it can also stand alone? Idk I just got lots more requests for makogou baby fic after writing And Perhaps. MakoGou family drabbles and oneshots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Everyone had crowded to the hospital the day after Gou’s delivery to see the baby. Makoto did his best to control the commotion, but it was Rin who finally barked at everyone to keep it down.

“He’s beautiful,” Rei sighed.

“He looks like Makoto!” Nagisa grinned. “But cuter, like Gou-chan.”

“Hey!” Makoto looked affronted.

Haruka peered at the baby, his blue eyes scrutinizing the child’s green ones.

“Do you want to hold him?” Makoto asked.

Haru smiled. “I don’t think I know how.”

“It’s easy,” Gou handed him the baby, showing Haruka how to hold his head. “See? He loves his uncle already.”

“What did you name him?”

The baby’s name had been a topic of heated discussion since Makoto and Gou found out they were having a boy. Rin would constantly come up with names that “just so happened” to be the names of famous Japanese swimmers. Nagisa wanted a girly name for “tradition”. Rei urged them to pick a name that was beautiful. Haruka was mostly silent on the matter, but he couldn’t understand why Nagisa was so hell-bent that the boy should have a girly name.

Gou was adamant. No son of hers would be confused for a girl when the teacher called roll. Haru had secretly cheered, and Makoto had only smiled.

“His name is Minoru,” Gou rested back onto her pillows.

Rin looked over Haru’s shoulder at the small face framed in a blue blanket. “He looks like a Minoru,” he said approvingly.

“He looks like Makoto,” Haruka laughed when the baby stuck out his little tongue. “Hello, Minoru. We’re glad you’re here.”

“Let me hold him next,” Nagisa held out his arms. “He needs a turn with all his uncles!”

Gou reached out and tugged Makoto’s hand. “Get the camera,” she whispered.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minoru's first bath.

“Alright, Minoru,” Makoto held his son at eye level. “Today is the big day. I know you’re nervous, but it’s ok. I’ll be there every step of the way.”

“I think you’re more nervous than he is,” Gou noted. Minoru yawned, and she could have sworn his expression was one of profound boredom.

“I’m not nervous,” Makoto insisted. “It’s just a big deal. A really big deal. I don’t want to mess up. What if I drop him? What if he doesn’t like the bath? Ren used to hate baths, so did Ran. I can still hear their screams.” He shuddered.

“You’re not going to drop him,” she leaned up and kissed her husband’s cheek. “You’ll be fine. Just make sure to smile for the camera.” She held up the lens and snapped a picture.

Carefully, Makoto shifted Minoru in his arms so he could check the water for the fifth time with a careful wrist. He turned to his son, who was blinking calmly at his father. “Ready?” With a gentle hand, Makoto lowered the baby into the warm bath. Minoru looked at his father, then his mother, who was busily taking pictures for the baby book. With a steady hold, Makoto washed his son, starting with his downy brown hair.

He was mindful of the baby’s eyes, and when Minoru squirmed in his father’s hold Gou was glad it was Makoto’s large hands holding their son in the little bathtub instead of her much smaller ones. He had an arm secure around the infant’s back, his little head resting in the crook of his father’s elbow. Watching her husband, his expression gentle as he carefully gave Minoru his first bath, Gou was filled with a feeling of immense contentment.

“I think he likes his bath,” Gou remarked as Minoru curled his little fists. Though he kicked his legs and wiggled his arms, the baby put up no resistance and was remarkably quiet, save for a prodigious yawn.

“Like his uncle Haru,” Makoto joked, using a cup to rinse the baby carefully. Between the two of them, Minoru was rinsed and wrapped in a warm towel (a gift from Rin) and Gou left Makoto to diaper and dress the baby while she drained the tub. When she joined her husband and son on the bed, Minoru was already asleep in his father’s arms, his tiny fists curled by his face.

“It won’t last,” she pressed a feather light kiss to the child’s forehead. “He has to eat in an hour.”

“We can let him sleep though, right? It’s useless to wake him anyway,” Makoto adjusted the collar of the baby’s onesie and sighed. “He looks so cute. I don’t want to put him in his crib.”

Gou curled up next to her husband on the bed. “Your arms will get tired.”

“Never.”

She smiled. “You’re hopeless.”

Makoto kissed his wife. “You’ll get your turn when he wakes up, don’t worry.”

Gou knew she should get up to make dinner, but she rested her head on Makoto’s shoulder instead. It wouldn’t hurt to take a little rest before Minoru woke up and she had to feed him. Her bed was warm, Makoto was warmer, and their son was resting peacefully. Dinner could wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Babies are born with the umbilical cord still attached. Tub baths are not recommended until the cord stump dries up and falls off, a process that takes up to 21 days. The first bath is usually given once the small wound heals a few days later


	3. Chapter 3

When Makoto decided to become a teacher, he didn’t realize that he would have the additional benefit of having more time at home than most. Teaching gave him the opportunity to mentor young people and impart knowledge, but it also gave him holidays at home with his baby son, who was somehow getting cuter every day.

Sometime after Minoru started sitting up on his own, a student teacher was hired to help out at the high school. Makoto realized he was no longer officially the rookie, and that he was long overdue for a leave of absence.

He took the opportunity to take the school year off to stay home with his son.

Gou was skeptical. She knew how much her husband loved teaching, and she was certain he wouldn’t last the term at home.

“You don’t have to do this. My mother likes watching him during the day. And you know the boys are always fighting over who gets him on Fridays.”

“I know,” he blew a raspberry onto his son’s tummy, delighting in Minoru’s squeals. “I just miss him.”

Her smile grew soft. There were no more arguments on the matter.

~

During Makoto’s first year of college, Gou had taken up the hobby of sending him pictures of the stray cat that lived in his neighborhood. The kitten had been an important mediator in their early courtship days, providing a welcome distraction when the conversation grew awkwardly quiet or too emotionally intense.

The photos had started out simple, just pictures of the cat eating, or playing. Soon they evolved into Gou dressing the cat up in various costumes. Makoto thought it was silly, but it also eased some of his homesickness and cheered him up when he was missing home (he missed _her_ too, but Gou was a clever girl and had shown him that a camera was an _excellent_ way to ease that feeling).

He was reminded of those early days when he was shopping with the baby and he spotted a particularly cute chef outfit. The white coat came with a tiny chef hat, and Makoto couldn’t resist. Gou received a photo that afternoon of her baby sitting on their kitchen counter, a toothless grin on his face and a wooden spoon in his pudgy hand.

_Where did you get that?_

_I bought it this morning. I thought it would look cute._

_It does! He looks adorable! I love that hat on my sweet boy._

He didn’t mean for it to continue. But then there was a pirate costume with an _eyepatch_ (the baby pulled at it, and Makoto had to be quick with the camera) then the puppy costume, which was so cute Makoto not only sent a photo to Gou but also called Haruka.

“Haru, you need to come over.”

“Why?”

“You need to see something.”

“Is everything ok?”

“Yes! I’m playing with Minoru. He’s dressed up in a puppy suit.”

There was a pause. Then,

“I’ll be right over.”

When Haruka arrived Makoto was lying on his stomach on the floor, while the baby chewed his father’s glasses happily. The child really was dressed in a puppy suit, complete with long, drooping ears and a tail.

“Who is Papa’s cute puppy? Who is it?” The baby squealed a laugh when Makoto tickled his chubby feet. “I’m going to eat these puppy toes!”

Haru’s eye twitched. Makoto looked up, just the slightest bit guilty. The baby laughed at his uncle, tried to crawl to Haruka, and fell over, rolling onto his back. The costume’s ears slumped forward over the child’s face.

“Well? Isn’t he cute?” Makoto stood up and picked up his son. “I just want to eat him up!” He kissed the baby’s chubby cheek.

Haruka blinked. Then, in one swift motion, he pulled out his cell phone and snapped picture after picture. “Cute,” he said, eyes sparkling. “So cute.”

The baby soon wanted to hold Uncle Haruka’s cell phone, which was Haru’s cue to take the baby from his father so Makoto could prepare lunch.

“You should dress him up as a dolphin next time,” Haru suggested as he tugged at the puppy ears.

~

It was only a matter of time before Rin called, miffed he wasn’t let in on the costume party.

“Haru was lording those pictures over me. I can’t believe you called him to see.”

“Sorry,” Makoto laughed. “It was so cute I panicked.”

“Well I’m coming over tomorrow. And I’m bringing a costume.”

“Eh?!”

~

Makoto should have guessed that Rin would bring a shark costume. And he had to admit, his son seemed to like it as well. He was fascinated with the fin, and kept trying to grab at it, like a puppy chasing its tail.

“Ahhh, Minoru, you look so cute,” Makoto cuddled his son in his lap, soft baby fingers grasping at his father’s hair. Minoru laughed, delighted when Makoto lifted him high in the air. “Do you like your costume?”

“Read it and weep, Haru,” Rin took a picture with his camera. “He’s going to die when he sees these.”

~

It wasn’t long before word of Minoru’s costumed adventures reached the rest of their circle of friends. With the new audience came new requests. Nagisa wanted to see the baby dressed in an orca costume. Rei requested something regal, like a prince. Haruka showed up one day with the promised dolphin outfit and Rin in tow.

“No way am I missing any more of these,” Rin grumbled. “Though I guarantee you the shark will be cuter than this lame dolphin costume.”

Gou was the only one who had no requests. “He’s our son,” she told Makoto when he asked if she had any costumes in mind. “He’ll look adorable in anything you put him in because he looks just like his papa.”

Makoto preened a bit at that, and though he said nothing he pulled his wife close to reward her for her praise.

~

_Epilogue_

_~_

“Mom.”

“Yes?”

“Why do you have an album of me in costumes?” Minoru held up the blue and yellow album, a picture of a baby in a shark costume on the cover. “They’re all from when I was a baby.”

Gou sighed. “Go and ask your father.”

**Author's Note:**

> Minoru “may be written with the character for “reality; truth”. Other possibilities include the character for “harvest; ripe”.”
> 
> Digitalsoop pointed out that the character for reality/truth 實 is similar to the character used 真 in Makoto’s name and I just really loved that idea, it seems very like them to pick a name like this. And it sounds cute with Tachibana.


End file.
